Page:The invasion of the Crimea Vol. 4.djvu/494

 464 APPENDIX. explicit. It is probable that the last of the two modes of speecli was the one which Sir John Burgoyno mainly used; but as often as he expressed his approval of a resort to the siege-trains — and this he certainly did in what Lord Kaglan called a ' sanguine ' way — he of course was putting Lis negative upon the idea of an immediate assault. For Sir John Eurgoyne to say that he did not advise against an immediate assault is much the same as if a member of the Oxford Senate were to describe his part in the election of 18G5 by saying, ' I did not vote against jNlr Gladstone ; Sir John Eurgoyne and to the Oxford elector would bo the same : ' True it is that you delivered your judgment ' that to affirm one proposal was to negative the other one.' Just as the vote for Mr Gathorne Hardy involved the rejection of Mr Gladstone, the recommendation of a resort to the siege-trains carried with it the rejection of any plan for an immediate assault. This is all that I have to say in reference to those parts of the letter which touch matters lying within the range of Sir John Burgoyne's j)ersonal observation. In some parts of his letter, however, Sir John Eurgoyne, as he is well entitled to do, has ventured upon the field of conjecture. He does not believe, he says, that Lord E;ig- lan ever entertained the idea of an assault ; and, on the ground of the supposed improbability, he ' greatly doubts ' the flict of Lord Lyons having proffered that advice to Lord Eaglan which is stated in Mv Loch's MS. To this I answer that Mr Loch (who is one of the most accurate of men) read over the memorandum to Sir Edmund Lyons ; that Sir Edmund Lyons approved it as a faithful account of his statements; and that to numbers of men still living Sir Edmund Lyons gave a closely similar account of the part that he had taken. Eut T do not leave the matter
 * I only voted for Mr Gathorne Hardy.' The answer to
 * in the afhrmative form, but the circumstances were such